The Long Road Ahead
by inkyandalbatross
Summary: The thing was, I knew about the Rifts, I mean, everyone did, but, like most people, I didn't think that I could possibly be affected. I mean you heard about it all the time on TV people getting caught in a Rift and disappearing, never to be seen again. And that was tragic, don't get me wrong, but it wasn't about to happen to me. [GiME. Tenth Walker]
1. Chapter 1

**The Long Road Ahead**

**Chapter One**

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Lord of the Rings.

* * *

_The thing was, I knew about the Rifts, I mean, everyone did, but, like most people, I didn't think that I could possibly be affected. I mean you heard about it all the time on TV people getting caught in a Rift and disappearing, never to be seen again. And that was tragic, don't get me wrong, but it wasn't about to stop me from going out and living my life, because after all, it wouldn't ever happen to me._

_Well, I say that but I'm not the kind of girl who likes to gamble, so at least when I fell through that day I had a basic Rift kit (even though it was three or four years passed the expiration date) in my bag. It probably saved my life._

* * *

Drea liked to think she had a pretty level head on her shoulders, and people told her that she was good in a crisis, but when she woke up feeling a little like she'd been struck by lightning and a lot like she was lying in the cold snow and found herself surrounded by a group of very strange looking strangers, she couldn't help but scream and flail a bit.

"Get away from me!" she shrieked scrambling to her feet only to have all the strength go out of her limbs and find herself toppling to the ground again.

Her head was spinning, and there was a weird echoing in her ears, and aside from having no balance to speak of her whole body felt like it was pins and needles.

One of the strangers, a dark haired man with an easy two weeks accumulation of scruff, knelt down next to her, saying something in a low cajoling voice, in a language that Drea didn't recognize off the top of her head.

It was then that she realized that at least part of the problem was that her implant was off. She reached up and quint-tapped behind her left ear and winced at the sensation of the implant activating from standby mode it's various tendrils unfurling in her mind, lighting up the world with an extra level of awareness.

The stranger was speaking again, reaching out to her with grimy hands, palms up in the usual gesture of surrender, his tone was soft and measured like he was talking to a small child or a frightened animal. Even with the implant active she didn't recognize the language either, and with the implant she had a much deeper database to draw on, that was more than a tad alarming. Still she started to gather information, not only from the stranger in front of her but also from what she could discern of the mutterings of his buddies, arrayed out behind him in the pure white snow like ducklings.

More insistently the scruffy guy in front of her touched her wrist drawing her attention back to him.

"I'm sorry I don't understand you," she said, shaking her head.

There was another barrage of softly spoken words, lilting upwards in a traditional questioning tone.

"I don't understand," she repeated tapping at her head and then her lips and shaking her head again.

The stranger sat back on his haunches in the snow and called out to one of his companions, or at least that's what Drea assumed happened given that the old man in the pointy hat came to crouch down in front of her and speak at her in languages that she still didn't recognize. All Drea could do was shake her head every time the man gave her a pointed look and try not to flinch and squirm too much while the scruffy guy poked and prodded her.

He was looking her over for injuries she finally realized as he was probing around her skull and she had to warn him away from her implant lest he accidentally flick it into standby again.

Finally apparently satisfied that she wasn't badly injured if she was injured at all and that she didn't recognize any of the languages they'd bombarded her with the scruffy guy helped her to her feet where she swayed dangerously, her knees threatening to give out on her again.

Scruffy guy was quick to steady her putting a solid hand on her hip and letting her grab onto his arm to keep herself balanced.

The world pitched and tilted under her outlined in green-gold auras, where she wasn't all but blinded by the light on the snow. And there was snow as far as the eye could see, deep fluffy looking white dollops of it spread over the crags of the mountain tops arrayed around them, the silver-white stark against the cornflower blue of the sky.

Drea blinked and blinked, wondering if maybe she wasn't seeing things correctly, because, after all, it was only early October and although it was chilly when she left the house they couldn't expect snow for another month. Besides that there were no mountains like this anywhere near her house in the city, in fact she'd have to drive nearly clear across the country just to see some.

When the realization hit her it nearly knocked her off her feet again.

Taking it all in though it was obvious what had happened.

"Rift," she squeaked out past the lump forming in her throat, "I fell through a Rift. Fuck. I'm Rift-Lost. I need to sit down, shit, but seeing as how I just got up that'd be counter frigging productive," she babbled to herself, scraping a hand through her hair.

The strangers gave her some odd looks but a few of them seemed to realize she was panicking because the old man's steely blue gaze softened and he gave her a grandfatherly pat on the arm repeating one of the phrases she'd heard out of the scruffy guy. Well, it was almost the same. There was a sound's difference here and there that she was able to pick out with the implant's gift of word-perfect memory, but the intent to sooth and comfort seemed to be the same.

The scruffy guy said a few things to the group at large, his tone stern and scolding, and she could feel the rumble of his voice at her back.

It was then that she noticed how much taller a number of the people around her were. Scruffy guy had to top out at six foot five or six, and the old man wasn't much shorter, the slender blond was of a comparable height, maybe taller by a few centimeters and the bearded man with the dark auburn hair and neatly trimmed beard who answered the scruffy guy's scold with a few short and presumably diplomatic words of his own had to be at least six foot six himself, and seemed like he might be taller as well.

Now at five foot seven Drea wasn't a short girl, in fact she was about average for her family and one of the tallest among her coworkers but she was easily dwarfed by these towering guys. In contrast the last five members of the group, the ones who were mostly quiet for the discussion going on above her head, only piping up here and there, were incredibly short. The tallest of them wasn't more than five feet, although he had a stocky build, and the other four hovered somewhere around the four foot mark.

They looked like small children with their smooth faces and softly curling hair, but their features were adult, and they were standing barefoot and ankle-deep in the snow.

And the more Drea came back to her wits and examined the people around her the more different they looked, the slender blond had eerie blue eyes, an impossible shade of blue, and his ears tapered to an elegant point. And he was standing on top of the snow as though he weighed nothing at all. That was definitely strange.

Beyond that their clothing was like something out of a renaissance fair or dungeons and dragons gathering, and they carried axes and swords and bows and arrows like it was normal.

Somewhere in the midst of all her gaping it was decided that they should start walking, and so Drea allowed the scruffy guy to loop an arm around her waist and guide her as she attempted to stagger forward through the snow that seemed to pitch and heave under her.

What she really needed was a nap, a chance for her brain to reset and readjust to having the implant all up in its business. Well, a nap and some dry clothes, preferably a set of good winter clothes. Her little stint in the snow had soaked through her leggings and the hem of her sweater and her boots and jacket were meant more for show than actual protection from the elements. Although good leather and her religious use of waterproofing spray kept her feet dry even if they weren't particularly warm, so there was that to be grateful for.

That and the ratty edge of the cloak that scruffy guy draped over her when he noticed her shivering, keeping out the worst of the wind and letting her leech off some of his body heat.

"Thank you," she said managing to tilt her head up enough to smile at him without overbalancing.

He smiled back at her, saying something himself with a small nod of his head that somehow felt like a bow, and nudged her forward insistently.

As it turned out there was nothing to do but concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other, but since scruffy guy was steering her she let her thoughts wander, turning over her situation in her brain.

There were only two reported cases of the Rift-Lost returning to Terra Firma, and both of those were induced for scientific study. She'd actually read some of the studies back in high-school for a project but reviewing that information wasn't really helpful.

All it told her was that she wasn't going to be able to get back to Terra Firma, so she should put that out of her mind, and it reminded her of the importance of keeping an updated Rift kit, one that was stamped with the approval of the Bureau for the Location and Containment of Interdimensional Rifts on her person at all times.

She'd stopped buying new Rift-kits early on in her university days, because those things were frigging expensive, but she might have an old one still stuffed into the bottom of her bag.

She craned her neck a bit, looking around, she'd had her bag on her when she'd fallen through, or so she assumed, she'd certainly had it on her when she'd started running to catch the shuttle bus to campus and then after that everything was fuzzy. She thought she might have tripped, had she lost the bag then?

No, she finally spotted it over the slender blond's shoulder and it looked fine, nothing torn or messed with.

Okay so first mission, a nap, second mission, retrieve her bag and get out that Rift kit. Third mission-

She honestly wasn't sure what she was going to do once she had the Rift kit. What could she do after all? She had no money, nothing much to trade, couldn't speak any of the native languages yet, and besides all that seemed to be in the middle of the wilderness. So maybe she should make the third mission to follow along with this group of people and hope that if she was very quiet they'd let her tag along.

Scruffy guy seemed nice enough, the chivalrous type at the very least since his hands hadn't strayed an inch from her waist except in the necessary course of keeping her from flopping face first into the snow, and he'd received her good manners with some of his own.

The old man too, he'd treated her kindly, tried to be soothing.

So it was probably okay to assume, for now, that these were good people. She could always reevaluate if it seemed like they were trying to sell her to a slave market or harvest her organs or sacrifice her to their gods. She shook her head firmly to clear it of such thoughts. No negativity, she was going to assume these were good people until they gave her a reason to disbelieve that.

The language problem would solve itself soon enough, already her implant was collating the data gathered from listening to the group speak so soon enough she should be able to understand what they were saying and after that she should be able to make a go at communication.

She just needed to wait. Walk and wait and try not to freeze to death in the meantime. Piece of cake.

* * *

**Author's Notes: **And that's the first chapter! Thanks for reading!

I've always wanted to write one of these GiME tenth-walker fics (they're my guilty pleasure) and so has my better half Albatross so we decided to make an account together, she'll be posting her story here too under this penname so follow us if you'd like to read it!

I'm always looking for advice and suggestions about my writing and the plot, so feel free to review or PM me with your opinions! Every little bit helps me improve as a writer so I really appreciate it!

-Inky


	2. Chapter 2

**The Long Road Ahead**

**Chapter Two**

**Disclaimer:** I don't own Lord of the Rings.

* * *

_Maybe it was stupid of me, not running away when I had the chance. I'd never claimed to be brave or adventurous after all. But I'd wanted to hang on to the only familiar things in the strange new world in front of me. And I soon found myself embroiled in a conflict I didn't even understand. _

* * *

It seemed to Drea as though they'd been walking for hours, and perhaps they had been but with the sun completely blotted out by the sudden appearance of an ominously dark, roiling storm cloud, it was nearly impossible to tell how much time had passed.

She'd become somewhat steadier on her feet as practice gave her the ability to compensate a little for her wobbliness but she was cold and exhausted and it didn't look like a rest-break was anywhere in the near future.

And then to put the cherry on top of this delightful situation the wind picked up, cutting through the thin protection afforded by her clothes and chilling her to the bone, and it started to snow. Big soft flurries that seemed innocent enough tangling in her hair and alighting on her eyelashes but that threatened to reduce visibility and increase the accumulation of snow by a significant amount.

There were a few terse words spoken among the men at this development, but no sign of stopping.

And really, where would they stop?

There wasn't much along the narrow path they seemed to be following and the mountain itself provided no protection from the elements. At least if they kept walking they weren't risking death by hypothermia and exposure. Though Drea did wonder how the guys trudging along in snow that was waist deep in their bare feet hadn't succumbed to frostbite yet.

As for herself, well, scruffy guy was trying his best but it wasn't really helping. Still, what could she do? Nothing. She was at the mercy of the elements and the kindness of strangers. Maybe she should see about getting into that Rift kit sooner rather than later.

Now Drea was aware to some degree that they were climbing the mountain but up until this point the slopes had been gentle. As the wind and snow picked up however, scruffy guy had to all but drag her up the side of a steep slope, and when she glanced behind her all she could see was white and faint grey shadows, although she knew that the others in the group weren't too far behind, not more than a few feet certainly.

The old man, who was breaking the trail with the help of his gnarled walking stick, couldn't be seen at all in front of them, the soft grey of his outfit and the white of his beard making him all but invisible.

The slender blond, although not bogged down in the snow like the rest of them was having his own troubles. When he passed besides them from out in front she could see him struggling against the high wind. Even going so far as to stumble sideways on occasion.

Drea had spent her childhood living up north a good three hour drive from the city and there were days when her grandma's door was all but buried in snow drifts but she'd never seen a storm hit this hard and fast before. It seemed like the snow had accumulated another foot since they'd started up the slope.

When they reached the top, and Drea was panting with the struggle to move her body through the thick snow, even with help, there seemed to be a general consensus that it was—finally—time for a breather.

Scruffy guy left her to lean up against the face of the mountains and catch her breath along with the four guys going barefoot who hunkered down against the snow, breathing hard and talking quietly amongst themselves.

Scruffy guy and the old guy seemed to be having a serious discussion, low voiced and tense, although Drea couldn't pick out any of the words. As they spoke though the wind started to die down and the snow let up, giving them at least some visibility.

Drea tried to think of how she could shanghai the blond guy into giving her back her bag, especially since walking on her own for more than a few steps was a trick, but before she could do more that push herself gently away from the support of the wall, the neatly-bearded guy stomped over to her from the small discussion occurring at the front of the pack, and dug a spare cloak out of his pack to drape around her shoulders.

It wasn't anything like the heavy fur-trimmed number he was currently wearing; more like a less worn version of the serviceable cloak that scruffy guy was wearing.

"Thank you," Drea sighed with whole-hearted relief, burrowing into the fabric and pulling the hood up around her frozen ears.

The man replied with a tight smile, a few words and an encouraging pat on the shoulder. Drea gave him what she hoped was a brilliant smile in return and tried to conceal some of her nervousness by stamping a flat area in the snow around her so she wasn't buried up to her knees in snow.

The cloak smelled of oil and a spice not unlike cedar and even more faintly of horses. The familiarity of it was encouraging, like maybe this world wasn't so different from her own.

When discussions had been concluded and everyone had caught their breath there was a bit of reshuffling that happened in that Drea was ushered up to the front where the old man had her keep a tight hold on his belt and she had to concentrate more on walking.

She didn't really begrudge scruffy guy for abandoning her though, because he and neatly-bearded guy each took not one but two of the barefoot guys a piece and got them up in a piggyback. Not for the first time she wondered why they didn't just stop or turn back.

Of course, Murphy's Law being in complete effect, as soon as they started walking again the storm picked up again, possibly with even more ferocity than before, and Drea was as good as blind, only the trail carved before her and her grip on the old guy's belt keeping her from wandering off the edge of the mountain. Or just falling into one of the snow banks and not getting up.

Her limbs felt leaden and her breath was coming in rough and raw in her throat, every short gasp causing her sharp pain on top of her other laundry list of hurts and ills. It was the most discomfort she had ever had the displeasure to be in and her thoughts turned miserable and homesick in short order.

Thoughts of hot coffee in the campus express, or the Spartan comforts of her new apartment, or even snuggling up with her grandma in front of the big old fashioned hearth in the main room.

She'd never have any of that again, she reminded herself, everything she knew and loved was out of her reach.

They kept trudging, though, all of them, Drea included, moving along the mountain face at a steady, miserable plod.

The wind shrieked and howled, whipping around the dips and hollows of the mountain at high speed. It almost sounded like the mountain was screaming.

The slender blond shouted something to the rest of the group, though they could barely hear him with the din of the storm.

Above them there was a crack and a long tortured groan and a long spill of stones tumbled over the side of the cliff to bounce off their narrow ledge, dumping snow all down the back of their necks. Suddenly more afraid of tumbling off the mountain then of being lost in the driving snow, Drea released the old man's belt and he clambered up to join the blond on top of the snow.

Bellowing up at the sky like a madman he waved his gnarled stick around and his voice seemed to echo all around her, growing in volume rather than being muffled by the thick blanket of snow. And behind her scruffy guy and beard guy were shouting.

Feeling dizzy and afraid Drea pushed herself tight against the wall, and not a moment too soon. Above them the was a sudden sharp crack and a blinding flash of light.

"Lighting? In a snowstorm?" she shrieked, wide-eyed and incredulous.

And just like that there was a waterfall of snow and ice tumbling down on them from above.

Drea came back to herself, struggling to push aside the weight on top of her, her hand broke through to the air and in an instant the blond was dragging her up out of the snow his hair all but coated in clinging bits of snow.

By some unspoken consensus they didn't press forward. Instead a small hollow was dug in the snow and the ten of them plus the pack pony huddled together, damp and cold and snow covered. Still with the cliff face and a wall of snow as a windbreak and gathered as close together as they were it started to get warmer, if only marginally so.

There was a lengthy debate amongst her new companions the old guy and scruffy guy getting into it in polite tones with neatly-bearded guy, and short red-bearded guy occasionally contributing a heated point or two.

Drea for her part closed her eyes and tried to sleep, if she could just get a little sleep under her belt she knew that she'd be steadier on her feet and she'd feel a lot less helpless, unfortunately just as she was drifting off neatly-bearded guy shook her and one of the littlest guys awake with some urgency, his brows drawn together in a frown as he passed around the small flask of booze the old guy had nipped out of his robes. It was only then that she realized that she was an idiot. She knew well enough that people who fell asleep exposed to extreme cold ran the risk of never waking up.

Drea did have to hand it to that old guy though; it was some top notch stuff. Smooth and rich going down without any of the burn and it settled in her belly filling her with warmth and energy. Although it did nothing to help her implant-induced problems it was almost as good as a long nap in all other respects.

Eventually some of the wood being carried was built up in an attempt to start a fire, but nothing anyone tried was enough to combat the damp and wind long enough to have the wood catch light. Drea even took her turn, receiving her bag from the blond and trying her hand with a cheap dimestore lighter and a crumpled flyer advertising for a free thirty day gym membership that was made with paper instead of plasi-film.

Eventually, while the rest of the company passed around the flyer, marveling at it given their expressions, the old man pulled a rugged bit of clear crystal from his robes and fitted it into the top of his walking stick he then said something in a lyrical language and thrust the end of the stick at the pile of wood which promptly lit up with dancing blue and green flames.

Drea would be the first to admit that she put little stock in the otherworldly, that was, anything that couldn't be explained by nature and her laws. Hell, her own grandmother called her a stodgy biological determinist and quoted Hamlet at her when she grew stubborn about this or that thing. Still, sitting there in that well of snow watching the blue and green flames flicker and sway in the high wind her first thought was definitely magic.

Maybe it was the pointy hat, maybe it was the alcohol's influence but there it was.

Regardless of whether she owed the flames to magic or some science of this particular dimension Drea couldn't say that she wasn't immensely grateful for their existence as the pervasive chill in her limbs started to give way.

Since it seemed like they were going to be waiting out the storm for the night, Drea dug around in her bag until she found the Rift kit. The BLACIR stamp was two years passed its expiry date but the package itself, a vacuum pack made the kit pretty compact but there were enough rations for two weeks, a first aid kit with sterile bandages and alcohol swipes along with scissors and tweezers, there was also a superfibre blanket and a camp pillow, and most importantly there were data chips that could be read with any standard implant with information on a variety of survival topics. Of course Drea couldn't read them while her implant wasn't properly synced but the fact that they were there was a comfort.

She opened the pack and unsealed the blanket and camp pillow, leaving the biodegradable plasi-wrap to flutter off in the wind since she very much doubted there were trash bins let alone recycling receptacles anywhere around here.

Generously she shared the length of superfibre with the littlest guys settling it over their frozen looking feet.

Superfibre didn't look like much but it was flame proof, water proof, highly tear resistant and while it was lightweight and thin it held the heat in with the efficiency of a thick, fur-lined throw. Additionally, though it wasn't quite up to snuff for police-grade body armor that didn't stop it from turning knife blades and even, in some cases, bullets. The fact that it was a Rift kit requirement was part of the reason that the kits were so blasted expensive.

They passed the night like that, huddled together, listening to the storm rage around them. Eventually in the wee hours before dawn, when she was the closest thing to warm and dry that she'd been since she'd woken up in this world neatly-bearded guy allowed her to doze a full hour without waking her and when she was finally shaken awake she'd lost the auras dancing green-gold across her vision and her normal good balance and depth perception was returning to her, all implant-enhanced and most welcome after what amounted to a full day of staggering around helplessly.

In fact she was steady enough on her feet that she was able to duck quickly behind a snow-bank and take care of some business without one of the guys hovering over her or holding her steady so she didn't topple her bare butt into the snow, again. That would have just been unnecessarily embarrassing. And if she lingered a little longer behind the snow bank to give them a chance to water the snow themselves, well that was just good manners and practicality.

It had stopped snowing in the course of the night, and although the wind moaned it no longer went screaming around the mountain ledges. It was a little annoying to realize that the decision had been made to go back down the mountain rather than continue forward after they'd struggled all that way, but when scruffy guy and neatly-bearded guy went along ahead of them to clear a path through the drifts and ended up wading through snow that came up to their chests Drea decided to be relieved that they weren't pressing to go up the mountain and into the heart of the bad weather that still threatened.

The storm and the deep, thick drifts of snow only extended so far down the mountain and although it took a while to make the path through once they came out on the other side of it there wasn't more than an ankle-deep blanket of soft powder.

The trek downhill was certainly easier than the one uphill had been. By mid-afternoon they'd left the snow behind them altogether and at dusk they made camp at the foot of the mountain, starting a small cook fire and taking the time to rest properly and to eat.

Drea dug out one of her ration packs and chewed the jerky-like substance that likely contained no actual meat product while she listened to her traveling companions' voices wash over her. She thought that they were deciding what to do next since, apart from the slender blond and the red-bearded guy—the former seemed to be in a permanent state of optimism and the latter in a permanent state of grumpiness— there was a palpable air of defeat among them. Accepting a sip from the old guy's flask when it got passed around, Drea couldn't help but wonder where exactly they were trying to go.

More importantly though was whether or not they would take her with them. There was some heated debate about that too, and from the expressions and gestures Drea could decipher that they didn't want her to go with them for one reason or another, but also didn't feel like she was capable of navigating the outside world on her own. Probably they felt like they were responsible for her since they'd been the ones to find her in the snow on that mountain.

Well, Drea wasn't about to disabuse them of their notions. She certainly had no interest in being left alone in a strange world even if technically she probably could make her own way.

She never did get to find out what was decided, or if her new travelling companions had even made a decision because a thready far-off bit of wolf-song carried on the wind got everyone's back up at once. Tense and restless they shifted camp to higher ground among a circle of gnarled trees that had lost all but the most persistent of their leaves to wind and the coming of winter.

At first Drea didn't understand why the wolves' howling was so alarming to the others, because while yes it did put a primal sort of fear in her gut and raise gooseflesh all over her body she knew that hunting wolves were quiet and that they weren't so close as to be an immediate danger.

Wrapped in her superfibre and her borrowed cloak in the ring of light cast by the suddenly imperative fire Drea was easily able to drift off while the other's kept a wary watch on the shadows beyond their camp.

It was the pony that woke her, its whinnying scream and the stamp of hooves on hard earth. The rest of the group was already on their feet, some of them even had weapons in hand, firelight glinting of the edges of the swords.

Warily Drea got to her feet, tying the superfibre around her shoulders like a shawl and slinging her bag over her shoulder to rest on her hip. The deepening dark of the cloudy night didn't bother her, with the minimal light from the fire her implant was easily able to perceive the shapes that lurked in the shadows.

The old guy called out into the night, his voice ringing with authority, and one of the hulking beast leapt at him from outside the ring of light with a defiant toothy snarl.

Drea clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle her instinctive scream, flinching away, but the creature fell before it ever reached the old man a gold-fletched arrow protruding from its neck. The slender blond had his bow out and strung. There was an uncharacteristically serious expression on his handsome face as he peered into the dark.

All around them there was a chorus of angry snarls, and the sound of snapping jaws as the beasts circled them like sharks with the scent of blood.

They resembled terran wolves but only in the vaguest of senses. For one thing they were about the size of a black bear or a pony, for another their darkly mottled hides and thick bulging shoulders gave them a better resemblance to the hyenas she'd seen at the zoo and in nature documentaries from decades past that her grandma liked to pull out and dust off at regular intervals. The shape of their snouts and plate-sized were both very wolf-like but their eyes were cruel orange and amber flashes in the dark glittering with a malevolent intelligence that made Drea shiver.

It was suddenly all too clear why her new friends had been so tense at the first sound of howling.

Unarmed and defenseless as she was she was ushered into the centre of the group with the little guys, though each of them had a small sword out and was holding it awkwardly in front of them.

In contrast scruffy guy made quick work of the first wolf to enter the circle with a bold thrust through its neck. Neatly-bearded guy and red-bearded guy also put their axe and sword to good respective use while the archer in the group picked off those behind the main line of attackers, hitting his mark every time even in the dark and with the milling confusion of bodies.

Then the old man did, something—magic, a small part of Drea's brain insisted—and used his crystal and walking stick to set the ring of trees they were sheltering under on fire, an impossible perfect circle of fire that flickered blue and green between the more traditional reds and oranges. And it just kept burning, lingering through the rest of the night and until the grey of pre-dawn turned everything muted, colours watered down to shades of grey-blue, grey-purple, and grey-green, and leaving only a ring of dark charcoal and scorched earth in it's wake.

There were no bodies. There were scattered arrows littering the ground all around and the scuffs and prints of the milling wolves, but none of the dead wolves' corpses could be found. They'd mysteriously vanished with the thin wisps of fog as the sunlight began to creep over the horizon.

How had that happened though, and right under their noses? It didn't make any sense.

The mood of the company as they had their meager breakfast on the move was grim—harried and hurried— and by the time that the sun had fully risen they were well away from the site of the small skirmish and Drea had the sneaking suspicion that they were being hunted.

* * *

**AN: **Thanks to everyone who took the time to read, fave and follow!

Hopefully all of the description isn't too boring for you guys, I'm going to be including a lot more dialogue the further into the story we go but right now I have to give Drea time and exposure to learn the common tongue. Next chappie as well we get to play the name game and get everyone properly designated.

As always feedback, praise and criticism is much appreciated!

-Inky


	3. Chapter 3

**The Long Road Ahead **

**Chapter Three**

**Disclaimer:** I don't own the Lord of the Rings.

**Author's Notes:** Thanks to everyone who took the time to review, alert and fave! You guys are awesome!

* * *

_The hardest part was accepting just how far out of my element I actually was. I mean it's one thing to know in your head what's going on but getting your heart to believe it is a whole 'nother kettle of fish. _

* * *

They walked clear through the morning over miles of rocky trail dotted here and there with grasses and clumps of stubbly shrubs, sticking close to the foothills of the mountains that loomed over them. The weather turned clear with the wind dying off and the clouds retreating to the south side of the mountains, and the sun came out leaving the sky that clear cornflower blue.

Since she was warm enough in her own sweater and jacket Drea attempted to give neatly-bearded guy back his spare cloak but he smiled and told her to keep it, folding it and handing it back to her with a polite sort of insistence. So with a shrug and a quick thank you Drea tucked the cloak into her bag, and fell into step with him.

Neatly-bearded guy seemed to be troubled, and so did the slender blond and scruffy guy. The old guy who'd seemed the most reluctant at first was urging everyone forward, keeping to a pace that belied the full-grey of his hair and beard and the crags of his face. The short red-bearded guy though was all but bouncing with excitement. He'd moved forward to the front of the group and even occasionally ranged further ahead.

When noon came and went without a rest break and the scrubbly foothills turned into a rocky waste with nothing living except for a crusty, grey-green rock lichen as far as the eye could see, Drea dug out another of the jerky packets from her rations and chewed on it to distract herself from her tiredness and boredom, as well as to deal with the persistent gnawing in her stomach.

It was then that one of the little guys, the one with dark curls and a green jacket under his travel cloak, came up to him and made a short query pointing at her jerky.

"What's that?" seemed to be the most likely culprit to Drea, and she could have kissed the shorter guy.

Although she was picking up tonal qualities and sentence structures from listening to the debates going around in the group and had a fair idea of what something along the lines, "It's going to be alright," sounded like if she was ever going to communicate with the group she needed first and foremost to increase her vocabulary and the phrase 'What's that?' would be crucial.

"It's jerky," she answered, even though she knew that he wouldn't understand her, answering back was just polite, "Well technically since there's nothing like real meat in it its dehydrated nutritional supplement. Here, you can have some if you like."

She tore off a strip for him and handed it over with a grin of encouragement taking a bite of her own share to illustrate.

He tore his piece in half, popping one half in his mouth all at once and handing the other half off to one of his friends, the light-haired one in the yellow waistcoat. Both of them wrinkled their noses at the flavor, or rather the lack thereof, and Drea couldn't help but giggle a bit at the indignant faces they pulled.

They grinned back at her charmingly, looking pleased with themselves, and Drea decided that now was as good a time as any to put her important new phrase to use.

Bending she scooped up a rock and showed it to the dark-haired little guy, "What's that?" she enunciated carefully pointing at the rock.

The two friends exchanged looks, and the light-haired one answered, "That's a rock."

"A Rock. Rock?" Drea repeated, pointing at the rock for confirmation.

"Rock," agreed the dark-haired one with an exaggerated nod of approval.

Her pronunciation wasn't quite perfect and she suspected that it would sound to the group like she had a thick accent but she could work on fixing that later.

Next she grabbed a thick clump of her hair, tangled and probably pretty scary looking and held it up away from her face.

"What's that?" she asked again, pointing.

"Hair," said the light-haired one, while the dark-haired one said, "That's hair," almost in chorus.

"Hair," Drea repeated with a nod.

Getting the idea of the game, the two short guys bounced around eagerly helping her to name off every item of clothing they were wearing and all the different parts of the body and things around them like sticks, dirt, mountains and the sky.

They had just about run out of things to identify when up ahead the short red-bearded guy called out to the group with a rumbling sort of cheer and pointed off to their right.

Drea wondered if they had finally found whatever it was they were searching for, the old guy seemed to be pleased with the discovery at least. Drea moved forward curious to see what it was they were looking at and found that it was a small stream dribbling through a path cut in the rocks.

Looking around properly though Drea could see the signs that once upon a time this little trickle of a river had probably been wide and fast moving as there was a long snaking cut in the rugged terrain of the foothills and the stones were smooth and round rather than rough and jagged.

On their side of the little stream there was a badly mangled set of stone steps that climbed up onto a better preserved looking paved track, like a side-walk for the river. Its paving stones were cracked a weathered with age but without encroaching greenery the path remained fairly smooth and flat, a lovely relief from the bumps and dips of the foothills behind them.

Everybody had an air of relief about them upon finding the path but as they continued forward the nervous tension racked up again. As if they were glad that they'd found the path but anxious about moving forward.

Somewhere during the mid-afternoon hours, around what would be four o'clock on Terra Firma, judging by the sun, they stopped for a meal and a rest. It wasn't anything fancy, Drea continued to chew on her jerky, saving the squashed granola bar and the Ziploc sachet filled with dehydrated mango strips she had found, stowed in her bag for in-class snacks, for when she was unable to stomach the idea of another mouthful of the dried nutritional supplement.

The little guys traded her some jerky for some of their hard-tack journey-bread to lend a little variety to their meals, although they guarded their withered apples jealously, and Drea took the time to take off her boots and socks check her feet over for blisters.

She had one starting along the outside edge of her littlest toe and she frowned at it a bit trying to decide if a bandage would be enough to mitigate the rubbing or if she should drain it and put and bandage on and take the risk of infection. It seemed like they would be walking for a long time, and every war movie she'd ever watched emphasized taking good care of your feet—

The fair-haired little guy in the yellow waistcoat nudged her to get her attention and Drea looked up from her toes and shot him a questioning glance.

He and his friend had been muttering to each other low and fast under their breaths for a while now so she hadn't wanted to bother them but now they seemed to want something from her so she tried to look attentive and receptive.

"What's your name?" asked the fair-haired guy.

Drea frowned at him, "Name?" she repeated, since it wasn't once of the words she'd learned yet.

"I'm Merry. This is Pippin. What's your name?"

The fair-haired little guy had put both hands on his chest when he said that word, 'Merry' and since Drea now knew the words for shirt, jacket, waistcoat, buttons, and chest it wasn't difficult for her to figure out that Merry was what he was calling himself, so probably his name. And if that was the case then 'Pippin' was probably the name of his dark-haired friend. Better to make sure though.

"Your name Merry?" she asked pointing to the fair-haired guy, "Your name Pippin?"

"Yes, yes! That's right!" cried the dark-haired guy looking delighted.

"What's your name?" repeated Merry again, more slowly, putting both his hands on her knee.

"My name Drea," Drea said carefully.

"Drea," repeated Pippin with some difficulty, "Drea?"

"DREY-ah," exaggerated Drea.

"Drea," said Merry, almost correctly, it was close enough anyway.

"Drea," repeated Pippin.

"Yes," agreed Drea with a nod and a smile, mimicking Pippin, "Yes, that's right."

Excitedly, Merry and Pippin dragged her over, bare-foot and mincing slightly to their other two friends, a subdued little guy with dark hair and brilliantly blue eyes who smiled wanly and introduced himself as Frodo, and a plumper fair-haired guy who blushed slightly and called her 'Miss. Drea' with a nod of his head. He had a soft twang to his accent that struck her as being more rural, though that might have just been the fact that he didn't seem to be as well-dressed as his companions, seeing as how he was wearing a roughspun wool coat over his shirt and he didn't wear a waistcoat. His name was Sam.

Sam introduced their pack pony, a sweety who snuffled at her palm for a treat and let her pat his velvety nose even though she was empty handed, as Bill and then Drea found herself once again being dragged over to one of the group to repeat the process.

This time it was neatly-bearded guy who was leaning up against the giant shield he carried over one shoulder and gnawing diligently on a piece of hard-tack, his expression worried and pensive. He gave her a tense smile and a practiced bow. His name was Boromir. Although he'd given a much longer response, Merry and Pippin assured her that 'Boromir' was the important part.

There was some debate when they got to scruffy-guy, who was chewing on the end of an unlit pipe, and the slender blond, who seemed to be listening for something, Merry and Pippin insisted that he was called 'Strider' but scruffy guy himself laughed, ruffled their hair and introduced himself as Aragorn. So Drea tentatively decided that 'Strider' was probably a nickname, since although all the little guys referred to him as 'Strider' the others called him Aragorn.

The blond was called Legolas, and the way they said his name gave it a weird lyrical quality that wasn't quite an accent but more a specific emphasis on each syllable. He gave her an easy smile and pressed a hand over his heart, saying something in yet another language. One of the ones she'd been previously bombarded with according to the memories her implant called up, and one with the same lyricallity as his name. He said her name with a softer r sound as well, and Drea got the idea that he must be from a different place than the others.

The red-bearded guy by contrast rolled that same r dragging it out in his usual grumble, giving her a terse nod and saying that, "It's good to finally put a name to your face, lass." He was called Gimli.

Drea thanked him even though she didn't know what that meant. Merry and Pippin didn't seem to think it was impolite so that seemed to be the best response.

The old guy, who'd been watching the introductions proceed with a smile that was full of elderly amusement, the same indulgent kind you saw when parents or grandparents saw young people doing something they thought was cute. His name was Gandalf and he shook her hand politely. But somehow Drea also got the sense that he was keeping a close eye on her. Since he seemed to be the leader of their little band Drea was even more resolved than ever to be on her best behaviour.

'Look at me,' she thought to herself a bit wryly, padding back to where she'd left her boots and bag, 'I'm smart and not a bit troublesome. Won't you please keep me?'

After that Drea was given just enough time to bandage her blistered toe and wish for a thicker pair of socks before she was forced to hurriedly tug her boots back on and they started walking again. Drea had a feeling that there was likely to be a lot of walking in her future.

A query to Merry and Pippin about the proper word for 'walking' in their language lead to a quiet but rousing game of charades as they moved on from nouns to verbs in their lessons.

They walked clear until dusk without another stop and then they came to a sharp bend in the path, a bend that led away from the stream and its lazy gurgle. Above them stretched a sharp cliff with another ancient and frankly dangerous looking set of stairs.

Gandalf gestured around pointing out this thing or that thing with a nod here and there, and Gimli eagerly dashed up the stairs showing little regard for their steepness or weathered state.

The group followed after him at a more cautious pace with Sam helping Bill along. Bill was, Drea marveled, shockingly agile and docile for a pony of his size.

At the top of the stair Drea had to pause grimacing at the stitch in her side and catching her breath a bit while the others carefully moved forward. It seemed that either someone or the course of nature had taken the time to dam up the water that used to feed their little stream filling the whole valley at the top of the cliff with water and turning it into a dark, glassy lake at least half-a-mile wide.

It was a creepy place.

Drea liked stark landscapes, she'd spent her childhood summers scrambling over bare rocks and getting her arms scratched up by hybrid conifers, while her grandmother fished in the lake for their supper and grumbled about the fancy nature-lodge that had gone up ten years ago and the constant influx of city-dwellers who needed their implants on just to find the sky, but this was different.

This place was silent as a grave and so still, not even a breath of wind reached them over the towering cliffs that stretched up into true mountains, and the something about the lake sent a frisson of primal fear crawling up her spine.

She was not happy to find that they'd have to walk around it in the gathering dark and when Gimli tested the water along the shore and found it only ankle-deep—plenty shallow enough to slog through if they had to—she fought the insane urge to hiss at him to get out.

She didn't think she was the only one who felt that way either. Although Merry and Pippin didn't seem to notice anything out of the ordinary Boromir and Aragorn kept on glancing at it out of the corners of their eyes and Frodo seemed leery of getting even as close as they needed to in order to skirt along the edge, flinching even when in the course of their trek his foot slid on some loose portion of the bank and the edge of his foot got a bit wet.

That, Drea felt, might have been a bit of an overreaction but with the mood going from tense to hair-trigger in a half-mile Drea couldn't really blame him.

When they reached the other side of the lake it was full-dark, although just barely, and Gandalf and Gimli were, of all things, tapping on the cliff face while Aragorn directed the unpacking and re-packing of their things.

Bill the pony was unloaded and unsaddled while Sam cried silent tears against his neck and sent on his way with a slap to the rump that was all that could urge him out of Sam's embrace.

Most of the company was discarding their winter gear, extra layers and the bundles of wood. Drea came to realize that wherever they were going it was probably going to be a harder walk than even the trek up the mountain had been.

Somewhat reluctantly Drea dug her tablet and course readers out of her bag, setting them down next to the other discarded items with trembling hands.

She wouldn't need them, she reminded herself, there was no way that a book on statistical analysis or terran ecology would be useful and her tablet was nothing but a glorified notebook without the internet to connect to. She didn't need them. But she didn't really want to leave them either.

She blew out a long breath, turning away from her things. The best thing to do was not to think about it. Sam, miserable and teary though he was, had given up his pony friend, the least Drea could do was to not blubber over a tablet.

Gandalf had apparently found what he was looking for. A section of the wall had been cleared of plant life and as the moon came out from behind a wisp of cloud an etching of an arch, and a tree and some stars appeared, carved right into the cliff face and glowing silver-gold in the moonlight.

It was pretty amazing, and Gandalf looked very pleased with himself for finding it. Drea settled in next to Merry and Pippin watching Gandalf chant and gesture, and eventually curse, at the wall in front of him.

Drea had the impression that this was meant to be some sort of secret passage, although she couldn't find any seem or discrepancy in the rock even with implant enhanced eyes. And she did look, when the howling started up again, echoing off the hills she looked hard for a switch or indicator. But there was nothing she could see.

Eventually Gandalf threw down his walking stick with disgusted resignation and settled in next to Frodo on a fallen tree that had washed onto the lakeshore, leveling the carving with a piercing gaze of disapproval as though that would force it to reveal its secrets.

Drea privately thought the wall had a lot of nerve, keeping secrets when the man looked at it like that, but then again the wall was made of stone and even if it could perceive Gandalf's gaze—a fanciful thought that never would have entered Drea's mind in the comfort of her own world and her own apartment—it probably wasn't used to bending to the will of others.

"Open Sesame?" sighed Drea at the wall.

There was still no response, not that she'd actually expected one. Behind her Merry and Pippin had grown bored and were throwing stones into the lake where they plopped, and splooshed, shockingly loud.

In front of her Frodo stood up suddenly, speaking to Gandalf sharply. Drea could practically see the old-style lightbulb appearing above his head like in the cartoons.

Gandalf gave a pensive one-word answer, and the wall split. It split and groaned and creaked, the doors swinging open from the sheer face of the wall with a rush of stale, rotten air.

The dark behind the doors was thick and deep and as the company moved forward Gandalf dug into his robes for the crystal from before, once again settling it into the top of his staff as he moved forward without hesitation. Blowing gently on the crystal until it lit up from the inside like an LED.

The others followed him, Gimli first and then the taller men behind him with the Merry, Pippin, Sam and Frodo bringing up the rear.

Everyone moved carefully in the dark, waiting for their unenhanced eyes to adjust to the dim glow of Gandalf's staff and the faint filter of moonlight from outside. Gimli was talking his voice loud in the echoing chamber beyond the door, a pleased rumble that ended in something like a laugh.

Drea took two steps into the chamber and stopped short, "Jesus Christ," she breathed out into the silence.

Littered all around the entrance chamber were skeletons dressed in rusting armour and swathed in thick cobwebs, their chests often bristling with black arrows, and their faces twisted in agony.

Boromir made a soft comment, "This is no mine," he said, "It's a tomb."

And all at once Gimli seemed to realize what it was he was seeing in the dim light from Gandalf's staff, "No," he cried, "No!"

Legolas plucked an arrow from the chest of the skeleton nearest to him examining the arrow for a brief moment before tossing it aside, pulling his own bow from its quiver and stringing it with a practiced motion. He had an arrow knocked and ready on the string before Boromir was even done ushering them back out of the cave.

After that—well, Drea wasn't quite sure what happened after that, because everything became a blur of motion.

Behind her Sam called out for 'Strider' and Frodo called out 'Aragorn' his voice high and terrified and then the others were rushing out of the cave past her, shouting. And when she looked back Frodo was dangling over the lake by one ankle, held up by a monstrous green-grey tentacle as thick as the trunk of a tree, and the lake was frothing and seething as Aragorn, Boromir and Gimli waded into it, hacking at what seemed like hundreds of other tentacles with their swords and axe.

Drea was frozen, unable to do more than stare as adrenaline flooded her system and, with a roar the—thing, the creature in the water, whatever it was, pulled itself into the open air, its maw gaping and full of sharp white teeth.

It looked like the ancient pictures of the kraken, the legendary sea monster that they'd gone to see in the museum on her fourth grade field trip, though there would be no relegating this beast to the category of giant squid, not when it chased the company up onto the banks of the lake dragging it's body forward and out of its element.

Legolas loosed an arrow, and from the pained bellow that shook the ground around her Drea thought he'd probably hit his mark.

"Run!" Boromir urged her grabbing her arm in a grip like a vice and dragging her forward, "Come on! Into the cave!"

Finding her feet somehow in the midst of the panic that gripped her Drea rushed forward with the rest of the group, vaulting over a body and dashing up the stairs. She might have just kept running blindly if it weren't for the crash and groan of stone giving way.

The doors and the entrance to the cave were not, apparently, built to support the weight of the monster living outside their door and when it tried to follow them into the cave the whole entrance chamber collapsed, shaking the ground and sending dust and grit flying.

Drea stumbled at the top of the steps, heart in her throat, trying to make out individual shapes in the sudden penetrating dark. There was coughing behind her, and someone groaned a bit, but she couldn't see what was going on.

After a long moment there was a soft, clear rap of wood against stone and Gandalf's staff-light was once again lit, piercing the encroaching darkness and giving Drea enough light to see clearly. Everyone was fine she noted, doing a head count, dusty and shell-shocked and more than a little damp with lake water, but uninjured.

And then there was nothing to do but move forward, so that's what they did. Dusting themselves off and continuing out of the entrance hall into the blackness of the caves beyond.

* * *

**AN: **Phew! This chapter was particularly difficult wrap up for some reason. Hopefully it's not too choppy! As always feedback and comments as well as suggestions are more than welcome, so please feel free to leave a review on the way out!

til next time

-Inky


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